For day one, I didn't do anything fancy for the #DecemberAdventure, but after getting the kids up and before work I made a silly little card in Decker that makes mostly pronounceable strings of gibberish.
I'll sort out how I wanna share these and set up an honest-to-goodness log later today.
I have some ideas for larger toys I wanna make with Decker. I think I'll spend at least the first few days of the December Adventure with Decker and lil.
I deployed the weird little deck I made on day one, and cleaned it up a tiny bit. Not sure if I’ll share everything I make, but figured I’d share this one!
I went deep on lil and Decker’s table interface, exploring the edges and how far I can push it before it becomes unreasonable. It is really really powerful! At least the native version of Decker can handle a table with a couple thousand rows. I’ve imported a dataset of pokemon data into it. I think I may do something with that over the next few days!
Today, day 3 of the #DecemberAdventure, I didn’t write any code! Instead, I walked across town, and spent about 4 hours with a friend who’s nearing the end of a web development focused bootcamp. I introduced him to TypeScript, which I don’t love, but have spent a lot of time with for work. It was fun to see something old to me through new eyes and have to figure out how to explain some of the basic concepts.
I’ve also updated the list of adventure logs! There are so many!
After sharing yesterday’s adventure log I spent some time with uiua. It continues to blow my mind. Everything about it seems to make sense to me — the tooling is splendorous.
Today I did more than just explore Decker; today I began to actually make a thing! To the surprise of absolutely no one, a game. Nothing to show for it yet, but I’m excited. I have all the pieces I need in place — inter-card communication, something akin to constants, random number generation, an idea…all the things.
I didn't do much adventuring today, because the bulk of my day was eaten by a big ol' brain scan (hooray! brain bleed is resolved!) that left my eyeballs kinda fried. I did do a bit of sketching in Decker. I don't love drawing in it. I think I may create my maps and stuff in a different program and import them.
Today’s #DecemberAdventure was a strange ramble. I started by poking a bit at Decker, but, maybe inspired by some conversations I had today, and maybe just because I let my attention wander, I also noodled on implementing an htmx server.
I started a little bit on that a few different times — once in JavaScript, but that tasted too much of work, so I moved to Clojure (using Babashka) but quickly became confused because Clojure seems to be my kryptonite. Ultimately I landed on chibi-scheme. I don’t have much done, yet, but I do have a pleasant little servlet that returns HTML. If I continue, the next steps will be to add route handling, and assign an HTML fragment to each route. Nothing fancy. Oh, there was a brief stopover at Racket in that, too…wasn’t there.
This sort of thing is why I love the December Adventure, but also is why it feeds some habits that distract me from getting a big
... show more
Happy first night of Hanukah!
Today’s #DecemberAdventure was a strange ramble. I started by poking a bit at Decker, but, maybe inspired by some conversations I had today, and maybe just because I let my attention wander, I also noodled on implementing an htmx server.
I started a little bit on that a few different times — once in JavaScript, but that tasted too much of work, so I moved to Clojure (using Babashka) but quickly became confused because Clojure seems to be my kryptonite. Ultimately I landed on chibi-scheme. I don’t have much done, yet, but I do have a pleasant little servlet that returns HTML. If I continue, the next steps will be to add route handling, and assign an HTML fragment to each route. Nothing fancy. Oh, there was a brief stopover at Racket in that, too…wasn’t there.
This sort of thing is why I love the December Adventure, but also is why it feeds some habits that distract me from getting a big thing done — rather than focus on one big thing, plod plod plod, I flit from little dalliance to little dalliance.
This suggests I should learn from my friendly @ratfactor! I’m gonna add a “map” to my Decker project, since it is the thing I’d like to finish. Tomorrow I’ll sketch out a plan, and every day I’ll map where I came from, and where I’m headed next.
Day 8 of the #DecemberAdventure -- I’m gonna call this one a rest day!
I didn’t do any code-stuff, but I did write a blog post, practice doing some digital painting, and work on a story I’ve been working on off and on for a few months.
I also made an absurd amount of vegetarian sushi for dinner.
I jumped on to the #DecemberAdventure early today -- big ol' explorations and sorting out lil's table syntax, and how to programmatically handle data with it.
#DecemberAdventure update: the one and only internet-janitor (mind behind Decker and lil, and oK) responded to my question and I’ve been set forth! Onward!
The hiccup I was running into is that all queries in lil are pure expressions that can’t modify data in place and I was trying to modify an empty table instead of making a new one.
I ended up having a lot of time to spend on my #DecemberAdventure yesterday in the evening. I had a lot of fun -- I think I may have found a bug in how lil handles truthiness, or am maybe really misunderstanding how it should work.
My plan for today is to spin up a small sample project and reproduce the errors I've been seeing in isolation -- I'm hoping this will either help me sort out what is going on, or serve as a useful starting point for some questions on the Decker forum.
The root of the issue I talked about earlier today was, unsurprisingly, my fault! Having cracked the nut, I got 2/3rds of my game's combat system done!
Next up, I'll be adding logic to handle the opponent's actions. I remain deeply smitten by both Decker and lil. I *think* I may submit what I'm making into the December Deck jam, if it is still running when I wrap.
I went back to work for the first time in a bit, so had a lot to catch up on. Enough computer time for one day. Instead, I read the first chapter of The Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs.
I've read it before but it hasn't ever stuck. Hoping a re-read may help that.
I didn’t write a #DecemberAdventure update for day 12 because I was knee deep in potatoes making latkes.
I'm getting back into the swing of things after 2 days away from Decker. Today, Day 13, I added logic to the enemy in the combat system of my little game.
It is really boring, so I wanna tune it a bit, and maybe make it something other than just an “attack” or “rest” button. All the pieces are in place to start exploring different ways to handle these sorts of encounters, though!
I remain completely smitten with Decker and lil. Especially lil. It is a very pleasant programming system.
Tonight I’m going to read more of The Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs, too!
For today's #DecemberAdventure I took a hiatus from Decker. Instead, I dove into @Sandra's brev. I also explored her cst, that turns s-expressions into graphviz diagrams.
I’m not sure if I’ll pursue this, but I was noodling on making a little text-based toy where the object of the game is to create graphviz maps of some space you are exploring — like a traveling cartographer game?
I also continue to read The Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs.
No adventure log for yesterday's #DecemberAdventure -- I went to bed early 🍻
Today, I walked to the local library. There, I revisited the game in Decker for a bit — mostly I drew a silly map for it. Afterwards I started roughing in the bones of a game system in scheme.
Not much to show for it, yet, but I do always love re-visiting scheme. My brain isn’t in scheme-mode at the moment, so things that I think should be easy are proving mind bending, which is fun.
It is so much fun reading all of the other adventure logs! Though, to be honest, I’m not sure how ya’ll keep at it! Especially on work days, after work I’m so wiped out I don’t have much mental power to apply to adventuring.
Shout outs to ya’ll!
I explored Decker’s contraptions today. They’re a way to make re-usable, custom widgets.
I also revisited my game thing today.
I think I’ve made an error in how player state is handled. I haven’t totally sorted out what is going on yet. Like I said, I’m wiped, but, will try to figure that out soon.
I'm also enjoying following all the updates, it looks like most people managed to take off after the initial days of scafolding after all ❤
I've been doing my december stuff in the morning these days, in the afternoon we tend to have errands to do. If it wasn't for decadv I wouldn't be documenting any of the work I've been doing, so I'm grateful we're all doing it, and seeing everyone motivates me to keep at it! 🎄
I don’t usually like to do computer things in the morning — I try to preserve that time for reading. This morning, though, I woke up with an idea, so reached for Decker first thing.
I wake up between 4 and 5 AM to feed the cats and dog.
After they’ve finished eating there is almost always a strange and quiet moment where the cats sit right next to each other in the dawning light, and look out a particular window on to the street below.
The dog flops back to sleep, either under a desk or a bed.
Exploring my idea (to see if I could support @ratfactor's hiss stuff from within Decker) brought me to Decker’s pre-built module for visual novels!?
The kids are up now. The bustle of a day awaits! ONWARD ADVENTURERS!
Everyone should go read the source code for @ratfactor's hiss — it is so legible, and stylish — not as in “cool,” (I mean, it is) but it has a style and is consistent. I adore that.
I think I could implement hiss’ parser using lil, but I think updating Decker cards dynamically is beyond my capabilities…and potentially Decker’s abilities. I’m gonna keep noodling, though.
This will hopefully not be my only entry for today's #DecemberAdventure, but, early this morning I got the jump on something I’ve been meaning to start on for a while: while not directly a programming thing, I started reading on the math (and programming) behind large language models.
I started this, not because I’m particularly interested in making my own, or use them with any frequency, but because lately I’ve been drawn into more and more conversations where I’m finding the ability to talk about them as more than some sort of semi-mythical oracle a very useful skill.
So, with that said, this morning I focused on reading about embeddings, specifically the matrix operations that are useful in comparing and modelling large vector spaces against one another.
…and, I mean…this invites me to think “array programming, yo.”
Also, if you have any resources specifically about the math and programming around lang
... show more
This will hopefully not be my only entry for today's #DecemberAdventure, but, early this morning I got the jump on something I’ve been meaning to start on for a while: while not directly a programming thing, I started reading on the math (and programming) behind large language models.
I started this, not because I’m particularly interested in making my own, or use them with any frequency, but because lately I’ve been drawn into more and more conversations where I’m finding the ability to talk about them as more than some sort of semi-mythical oracle a very useful skill.
So, with that said, this morning I focused on reading about embeddings, specifically the matrix operations that are useful in comparing and modelling large vector spaces against one another.
…and, I mean…this invites me to think “array programming, yo.”
Also, if you have any resources specifically about the math and programming around language models don't hesitate to send those at me -- especially *anything* written by someone who isn't just regurgitating stuff that's come straight-steaming-outta either OpenAI or Microsoft.
I've mostly been focused on resources that are 2+ years old, if at all possible to avoid some of that.
Solstice! Today I hung out with friends, ran errands, made a big dinner, and generally chilled.
I’m sitting down now for the first time of the day at a screen.
Over the course of this adventure I’ve been reflecting on how what I always want to build is a game and how I hardly ever do it. I have countless (almost literally) starts at it, and hundreds and hundreds of ideas for games, but, when I sit down to do it I generally get eaten by technical hurdles that, paired with limited time, are a bit too steep to scale.
But on the inverse side of things, if I sit down to bang out a web app (what I do for work) I can almost literally do it with my eyes closed. The thing is, I have little to no interest in doing that in my spare time.
No real ask, or next step, just sharing this observation about myself that, is itself, not really new, but, remains true for me.
- I sewed a pink snake per my kid’s request - I pulled together a basic IRC bot
I used to sew a lot before having kids; as an undergrad I actually TA’d for a bunch of animation and puppetry courses that involved a lot of sewing and practical sort of hand-making. I did a bit during the pandemic lock downs out of necessity, but not much. I’ve been staring at all my sewing stuff for years, though, and wanting to get back into the habit of making freaky little guys.
The IRC bot was inspired by some conversations I had on fedi: I’m wondering if it could serve as a good playground for making little narrative games, where, rather than having to build an engine and physics and and and on and on I plop some new interactive commands into an existing bot. I chose IRC because it is easy as pie (see what I did there?), but I could imagine migrating to something else one day.
So far today I’ve done no substantial computering other than writing this #DecemberAdventure update. I spent most of the morning toodling around Portland on the cargo bike with a kiddo. We did the entire back cove, most of our neighborhood, a bit of the peninsula, and checked out a new playground -- it was fun (thought wicked chilly).
This evening I’m hoping to make either General Tso’s tofu (’tis the season) or dumplings, depending on what is in our cabinets.
I also got a package from a friend in Japan! He sent me a Japanese copy of Final Fantasy Tactics for the Gameboy Advance. I am wholly unequipped to play such a thing, but you bet your thumbs I’ll try!
For the last few days of the #DecemberAdventure I've been pretty quiet, but I've actually written the most code!
It isn't pretty, and it isn't even particularly useful, but I've continued to work on my silly little JavaScript game framework thing for making little sketches.
eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •For day one, I didn't do anything fancy for the #DecemberAdventure, but after getting the kids up and before work I made a silly little card in Decker that makes mostly pronounceable strings of gibberish.
I'll sort out how I wanna share these and set up an honest-to-goodness log later today.
I have some ideas for larger toys I wanna make with Decker. I think I'll spend at least the first few days of the December Adventure with Decker and lil.
https://beyondloom.com/decker/
https://beyondloom.com/decker/lil.html
Lil: A Scripting Language
beyondloom.comeli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •Two little things for the second day of the #DecemberAdventure!
I deployed the weird little deck I made on day one, and cleaned it up a tiny bit. Not sure if I’ll share everything I make, but figured I’d share this one!
I went deep on lil and Decker’s table interface, exploring the edges and how far I can push it before it becomes unreasonable. It is really really powerful! At least the native version of Decker can handle a table with a couple thousand rows. I’ve imported a dataset of pokemon data into it. I think I may do something with that over the next few days!
https://eli.li/_assets/bin/decker/giblang.html
https://eli.li/december-adventure-2023
NOTE! Decker's web interface isn't heaps accessible! I haven't pulled its code, yet, but may see if there is anything that can be done to improve it.
Oatmeal - December adventure, 2023
eli.lieli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •Today, day 3 of the #DecemberAdventure, I didn’t write any code! Instead, I walked across town, and spent about 4 hours with a friend who’s nearing the end of a web development focused bootcamp. I introduced him to TypeScript, which I don’t love, but have spent a lot of time with for work. It was fun to see something old to me through new eyes and have to figure out how to explain some of the basic concepts.
I’ve also updated the list of adventure logs! There are so many!
https://eli.li/december-adventure-2023
Oatmeal - December adventure, 2023
eli.lieli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •I forgot to thread yesterday’s #DecemberAdventure whoops!
After sharing yesterday’s adventure log I spent some time with uiua. It continues to blow my mind. Everything about it seems to make sense to me — the tooling is splendorous.
Today I did more than just explore Decker; today I began to actually make a thing! To the surprise of absolutely no one, a game. Nothing to show for it yet, but I’m excited. I have all the pieces I need in place — inter-card communication, something akin to constants, random number generation, an idea…all the things.
Devine Lu Linvega
in reply to eli_oat • • •eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •A little itty bitty #DecemberAdventure for me today.
I didn't do much adventuring today, because the bulk of my day was eaten by a big ol' brain scan (hooray! brain bleed is resolved!) that left my eyeballs kinda fried. I did do a bit of sketching in Decker. I don't love drawing in it. I think I may create my maps and stuff in a different program and import them.
eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •Happy first night of Hanukah!
Today’s #DecemberAdventure was a strange ramble. I started by poking a bit at Decker, but, maybe inspired by some conversations I had today, and maybe just because I let my attention wander, I also noodled on implementing an htmx server.
I started a little bit on that a few different times — once in JavaScript, but that tasted too much of work, so I moved to Clojure (using Babashka) but quickly became confused because Clojure seems to be my kryptonite. Ultimately I landed on chibi-scheme. I don’t have much done, yet, but I do have a pleasant little servlet that returns HTML. If I continue, the next steps will be to add route handling, and assign an HTML fragment to each route. Nothing fancy. Oh, there was a brief stopover at Racket in that, too…wasn’t there.
This sort of thing is why I love the December Adventure, but also is why it feeds some habits that distract me from getting a big
... show moreHappy first night of Hanukah!
Today’s #DecemberAdventure was a strange ramble. I started by poking a bit at Decker, but, maybe inspired by some conversations I had today, and maybe just because I let my attention wander, I also noodled on implementing an htmx server.
I started a little bit on that a few different times — once in JavaScript, but that tasted too much of work, so I moved to Clojure (using Babashka) but quickly became confused because Clojure seems to be my kryptonite. Ultimately I landed on chibi-scheme. I don’t have much done, yet, but I do have a pleasant little servlet that returns HTML. If I continue, the next steps will be to add route handling, and assign an HTML fragment to each route. Nothing fancy. Oh, there was a brief stopover at Racket in that, too…wasn’t there.
This sort of thing is why I love the December Adventure, but also is why it feeds some habits that distract me from getting a big thing done — rather than focus on one big thing, plod plod plod, I flit from little dalliance to little dalliance.
This suggests I should learn from my friendly @ratfactor! I’m gonna add a “map” to my Decker project, since it is the thing I’d like to finish. Tomorrow I’ll sketch out a plan, and every day I’ll map where I came from, and where I’m headed next.
eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •Day 8 of the #DecemberAdventure -- I’m gonna call this one a rest day!
I didn’t do any code-stuff, but I did write a blog post, practice doing some digital painting, and work on a story I’ve been working on off and on for a few months.
I also made an absurd amount of vegetarian sushi for dinner.
https://eli.li/december-adventure-2023#section-7
Oatmeal - December adventure, 2023
eli.lieli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •I jumped on to the #DecemberAdventure early today -- big ol' explorations and sorting out lil's table syntax, and how to programmatically handle data with it.
tl;dr it didn't go great
But there is hope, yet! https://eli.li/december-adventure-2023#section-8
Oatmeal - December adventure, 2023
eli.lieli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •#DecemberAdventure update: the one and only internet-janitor (mind behind Decker and lil, and oK) responded to my question and I’ve been set forth! Onward!
The hiccup I was running into is that all queries in lil are pure expressions that can’t modify data in place and I was trying to modify an empty table instead of making a new one.
eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •Big breakthroughs were made on my silly #DecemberAdventure game in Decker today!
I’m starting to find all the rough edges of both Decker and lil. None so bad, but fun little questions to noodle over as I make this thing.
…the siren song of array languages draws me ever nearer to the dastardly rocks. Will they be my desolation!? Keep watching to find out!
eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •I ended up having a lot of time to spend on my #DecemberAdventure yesterday in the evening. I had a lot of fun -- I think I may have found a bug in how lil handles truthiness, or am maybe really misunderstanding how it should work.
My plan for today is to spin up a small sample project and reproduce the errors I've been seeing in isolation -- I'm hoping this will either help me sort out what is going on, or serve as a useful starting point for some questions on the Decker forum.
eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •#DecemberAdventure -- day 10!
The root of the issue I talked about earlier today was, unsurprisingly, my fault! Having cracked the nut, I got 2/3rds of my game's combat system done!
Next up, I'll be adding logic to handle the opponent's actions. I remain deeply smitten by both Decker and lil. I *think* I may submit what I'm making into the December Deck jam, if it is still running when I wrap.
https://eli.li/december-adventure-2023
Oatmeal - December adventure, 2023
eli.lieli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •Day 11 of my #DecemberAdventure is another rest day.
I went back to work for the first time in a bit, so had a lot to catch up on. Enough computer time for one day. Instead, I read the first chapter of The Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs.
I've read it before but it hasn't ever stuck. Hoping a re-read may help that.
eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •I didn’t write a #DecemberAdventure update for day 12 because I was knee deep in potatoes making latkes.
I'm getting back into the swing of things after 2 days away from Decker. Today, Day 13, I added logic to the enemy in the combat system of my little game.
It is really boring, so I wanna tune it a bit, and maybe make it something other than just an “attack” or “rest” button. All the pieces are in place to start exploring different ways to handle these sorts of encounters, though!
I remain completely smitten with Decker and lil. Especially lil. It is a very pleasant programming system.
Tonight I’m going to read more of The Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs, too!
https://eli.li/december-adventure
Oatmeal - December Adventure
eli.lieli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •For today's #DecemberAdventure I took a hiatus from Decker. Instead, I dove into @Sandra's brev. I also explored her cst, that turns s-expressions into graphviz diagrams.
I’m not sure if I’ll pursue this, but I was noodling on making a little text-based toy where the object of the game is to create graphviz maps of some space you are exploring — like a traveling cartographer game?
I also continue to read The Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs.
https://idiomdrottning.org/brev
https://idiomdrottning.org/cst
brev
Idiomdrottningeli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •No adventure log for yesterday's #DecemberAdventure -- I went to bed early 🍻
Today, I walked to the local library. There, I revisited the game in Decker for a bit — mostly I drew a silly map for it. Afterwards I started roughing in the bones of a game system in scheme.
Not much to show for it, yet, but I do always love re-visiting scheme. My brain isn’t in scheme-mode at the moment, so things that I think should be easy are proving mind bending, which is fun.
https://eli.li/december-adventure
Oatmeal - December Adventure
eli.lieli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •#DecemberAdventure updates!
I let myself become very waylaid by scheme this weekend.
I created a scheme page in my wiki, and I captured a few useful bits of scheme code on the forget me nots page.
Later today or tomorrow I’m determined to return to Decker and lil to get my weird game prototype into a shareable state by the end of the month.
https://eli.li/scheme
https://eli.li/forget-me-not
Oatmeal - Scheme
eli.liDevine Lu Linvega
in reply to eli_oat • • •eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •Day 18 of the #DecemberAdventure wowowow!
It is so much fun reading all of the other adventure logs! Though, to be honest, I’m not sure how ya’ll keep at it! Especially on work days, after work I’m so wiped out I don’t have much mental power to apply to adventuring.
Shout outs to ya’ll!
I explored Decker’s contraptions today. They’re a way to make re-usable, custom widgets.
I also revisited my game thing today.
I think I’ve made an error in how player state is handled. I haven’t totally sorted out what is going on yet. Like I said, I’m wiped, but, will try to figure that out soon.
https://eli.li/december-adventure-2023
Oatmeal - December adventure, 2023
eli.liDevine Lu Linvega
in reply to eli_oat • • •I'm also enjoying following all the updates, it looks like most people managed to take off after the initial days of scafolding after all ❤
I've been doing my december stuff in the morning these days, in the afternoon we tend to have errands to do. If it wasn't for decadv I wouldn't be documenting any of the work I've been doing, so I'm grateful we're all doing it, and seeing everyone motivates me to keep at it! 🎄
eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •Day 19, #DecemberAdventure
I don’t usually like to do computer things in the morning — I try to preserve that time for reading. This morning, though, I woke up with an idea, so reached for Decker first thing.
I wake up between 4 and 5 AM to feed the cats and dog.
After they’ve finished eating there is almost always a strange and quiet moment where the cats sit right next to each other in the dawning light, and look out a particular window on to the street below.
The dog flops back to sleep, either under a desk or a bed.
Exploring my idea (to see if I could support @ratfactor's hiss stuff from within Decker) brought me to Decker’s pre-built module for visual novels!?
The kids are up now. The bustle of a day awaits! ONWARD ADVENTURERS!
eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •Quick part two for today’s #DecemberAdventure, day 19 part 2:
Everyone should go read the source code for @ratfactor's hiss — it is so legible, and stylish — not as in “cool,” (I mean, it is) but it has a style and is consistent. I adore that.
I think I could implement hiss’ parser using lil, but I think updating Decker cards dynamically is beyond my capabilities…and potentially Decker’s abilities. I’m gonna keep noodling, though.
http://ratfactor.com/hiss/hiss.html
http://eli.li/da-2023
Oatmeal - December adventure, 2023
eli.lieli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •This will hopefully not be my only entry for today's #DecemberAdventure, but, early this morning I got the jump on something I’ve been meaning to start on for a while: while not directly a programming thing, I started reading on the math (and programming) behind large language models.
I started this, not because I’m particularly interested in making my own, or use them with any frequency, but because lately I’ve been drawn into more and more conversations where I’m finding the ability to talk about them as more than some sort of semi-mythical oracle a very useful skill.
So, with that said, this morning I focused on reading about embeddings, specifically the matrix operations that are useful in comparing and modelling large vector spaces against one another.
…and, I mean…this invites me to think “array programming, yo.”
Also, if you have any resources specifically about the math and programming around lang
... show moreThis will hopefully not be my only entry for today's #DecemberAdventure, but, early this morning I got the jump on something I’ve been meaning to start on for a while: while not directly a programming thing, I started reading on the math (and programming) behind large language models.
I started this, not because I’m particularly interested in making my own, or use them with any frequency, but because lately I’ve been drawn into more and more conversations where I’m finding the ability to talk about them as more than some sort of semi-mythical oracle a very useful skill.
So, with that said, this morning I focused on reading about embeddings, specifically the matrix operations that are useful in comparing and modelling large vector spaces against one another.
…and, I mean…this invites me to think “array programming, yo.”
Also, if you have any resources specifically about the math and programming around language models don't hesitate to send those at me -- especially *anything* written by someone who isn't just regurgitating stuff that's come straight-steaming-outta either OpenAI or Microsoft.
I've mostly been focused on resources that are 2+ years old, if at all possible to avoid some of that.
eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •Day 21 of the #DecemberAdventure --
Solstice! Today I hung out with friends, ran errands, made a big dinner, and generally chilled.
I’m sitting down now for the first time of the day at a screen.
Over the course of this adventure I’ve been reflecting on how what I always want to build is a game and how I hardly ever do it. I have countless (almost literally) starts at it, and hundreds and hundreds of ideas for games, but, when I sit down to do it I generally get eaten by technical hurdles that, paired with limited time, are a bit too steep to scale.
But on the inverse side of things, if I sit down to bang out a web app (what I do for work) I can almost literally do it with my eyes closed. The thing is, I have little to no interest in doing that in my spare time.
No real ask, or next step, just sharing this observation about myself that, is itself, not really new, but, remains true for me.
eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •For today’s #DecemberAdventure I did two things:
- I sewed a pink snake per my kid’s request
- I pulled together a basic IRC bot
I used to sew a lot before having kids; as an undergrad I actually TA’d for a bunch of animation and puppetry courses that involved a lot of sewing and practical sort of hand-making. I did a bit during the pandemic lock downs out of necessity, but not much. I’ve been staring at all my sewing stuff for years, though, and wanting to get back into the habit of making freaky little guys.
The IRC bot was inspired by some conversations I had on fedi: I’m wondering if it could serve as a good playground for making little narrative games, where, rather than having to build an engine and physics and and and on and on I plop some new interactive commands into an existing bot. I chose IRC because it is easy as pie (see what I did there?), but I could imagine migrating to something else one day.
eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •So far today I’ve done no substantial computering other than writing this #DecemberAdventure update. I spent most of the morning toodling around Portland on the cargo bike with a kiddo. We did the entire back cove, most of our neighborhood, a bit of the peninsula, and checked out a new playground -- it was fun (thought wicked chilly).
This evening I’m hoping to make either General Tso’s tofu (’tis the season) or dumplings, depending on what is in our cabinets.
I also got a package from a friend in Japan! He sent me a Japanese copy of Final Fantasy Tactics for the Gameboy Advance. I am wholly unequipped to play such a thing, but you bet your thumbs I’ll try!
eli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •Instead of a #DecemberAdventure today, here are some photos I took at the very foggy beach.
I also took a gigantic nap with the dog.
https://eli.li/2023/12/25/2023-12-25-16-34-16
https://eli.li/2023/12/25/2023-12-25-16-32-46
Oatmeal | 📸 Photo
eli.lieli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •For the last few days of the #DecemberAdventure I've been pretty quiet, but I've actually written the most code!
It isn't pretty, and it isn't even particularly useful, but I've continued to work on my silly little JavaScript game framework thing for making little sketches.
https://eli.li/_assets/bin/game-frame/
Don't collect the bike. It breaks everything...
another game
eli.lieli_oat
in reply to eli_oat • • •As the #DecemberAdventure continues to wind down, I did an update on the last few days.
https://eli.li/december-adventure-2023
Happy adventuring ya'll!
Oatmeal - December adventure, 2023
eli.liDevine Lu Linvega
in reply to eli_oat • • •